Graduate/Junior Software Engineer Salary Question

Aspiring

Hi,

I've recently graduated from a BSc. Computer Science, and I'm currently applying for jobs as a graduate/junior software engineer, and doing interviews with a few places. A question that seems to come up a lot early on in play is about my expected salary.

I'm not really sure what the right answer to this question is (or if there is one), because from the people who graduated along with myself, they seem to be earning in the 30-50k range. I usually just say 35k because I would be quite happy with that tbh, but I don't want to sell myself short at the same time.

Any advice on this would be great.

Buford T Justice

Graduate salaries vary depending on companies and locations. That said I'd be hard pressed to find anyone hiring a graduate on 50K

Have a look a glassdoor or something like that for an indication on salaries.

You could also answer that you'd be looking for the market rate for someone who is at your level

mightyreds

I think what you said is correct in around 35K is probably the norm , I don't know about 50 , they would have to be an exceptional graduate to get that

14ned

Aspiring wrote: »

I've recently graduated from a BSc. Computer Science, and I'm currently applying for jobs as a graduate/junior software engineer, and doing interviews with a few places. A question that seems to come up a lot early on in play is about my expected salary.

As a fresh graduate, the correct answer ought to be "I'll exchange salary for experience". Most fresh graduates vastly overrate their value to employers. Most spend years getting their foot in the door due to unrealistic expectations.

Most graduates tend to round up what they say they earn in order to impress people. I'd expect a fresh graduate in Dublin or Cork to start somewhere in the 20-30k region. I'd expect a fresh graduate anywhere else 15-25k region.

Also bear in mind the tech bubble is likely to pop again soon. Statistically speaking the best lifetime earning engineers are those who retain their job during a bubble pop, as they retain starting salary plus increment, rather than the much reduced salaries for later entrants.

Niall

John_C

The minimum wage is approx €18,500. Graduate salaries can't be below that.

14ned

John_C wrote: »

The minimum wage is approx €18,500. Graduate salaries can't be below that.

Heh, hardly.

First two years fresh graduates can be paid below minimum wage. Plus you fire and rehire them each year so you only pay them for 48 weeks as a temporary worker. Takes the pay down to about 15k. It's fairly common practice for fresh graduates outside the main urban centres, indeed my wife is struggling to compete against fresh graduates to find work as she is retraining as an accountant, and she must be paid the full minimum wage unlike her classmates and have a real work life balance as she has children.

Niall

rosmoke

Everyone graduate I spoke with from same CS course signed for 30k+ from next year, there are cases with 60k and 90k but they would be top 5% of the class.
In Dublin an average would be 30-35k + bonus/pension/etc.
Any less than that and you're not in the right career.

incentsitive

If you get between 60 and 90k you are either a complete genius who is writing code for fun in the evenings and basically is a top dev already, or you are working in San Fran!

lawred2

rosmoke wrote: »

Everyone graduate I spoke with from same CS course signed for 30k+ from next year, there are cases with 60k and 90k but they would be top 5% of the class.
In Dublin an average would be 30-35k + bonus/pension/etc.
Any less than that and you're not in the right career.

bull.....sh!t

rosmoke

Ok, each with their own.

fatbhoy

lawred2 wrote: »

bull.....sh!t

Absolutely.

dvd.

Majority of places are offering roughly 32k. Exceptions would be places like Amazon or Google who I think pay around 60k.

Stark

35k is pretty reasonable for a computer science graduate in Dublin. That's what my current employer pays graduates (it's a standard rate, no negotiation at graduate level). There's health insurance and a 5% employer matched pension contribution on top of that. Previous employer had a similar graduate package.

FastFullBack

14ned wrote: »

Also bear in mind the tech bubble is likely to pop again soon.

What makes you say/think that?

smacl

dvd. wrote: »

Majority of places are offering roughly 32k. Exceptions would be places like Amazon or Google who I think pay around 60k.

€43k average salary for Google software engineers according to paysacle.com, range is €27k to €73k so I'm guessing the lower end refers to graduate salary. Amazon come out a bit better at €51.6k average on a range of €31k to €88k. Glassdoor shows similar but slightly higher results. Payscale.com have a graduate software engineer salary average at €29.5k.

Dubba

I recently landed a Graduate Software Developer job and I'm starting next week. During my interview, I also got the expected salary question and said whatever they thought was fair. When pushed I said market rate. When they called with the offer of 30k I jumped at it. I'm to be working on the cloud team, so will be working with interesting new tech such as Kubernetes/Docker, alongside Java, React, Jenkins, etc.

MarkR

Aspiring wrote: »

Hi,

I've recently graduated from a BSc. Computer Science, and I'm currently applying for jobs as a graduate/junior software engineer, and doing interviews with a few places. A question that seems to come up a lot early on in play is about my expected salary.

I'm not really sure what the right answer to this question is (or if there is one), because from the people who graduated along with myself, they seem to be earning in the 30-50k range. I usually just say 35k because I would be quite happy with that tbh, but I don't want to sell myself short at the same time.

Any advice on this would be great.

https://www3.ul.ie/careers/careers/stugrad/what_graduates_do.shtml

This might help. Have a look at science and engineering. Will give you an idea based on responses from last years graduates.

Tar.Aldarion

Hmm well Google can be a strange one, I imagine the pay scale can be very different depending on the person and €60 or €90k for them for the right person is nothing. The average salary for a grad in Zurich for them is over €100k or so I read on glassdoor last year. The average in London is lower but a grad started there this year on £250k (I was over in their offices a while back and was talking about it), I imagine that person had a phd though, I didn't ask.


For Ireland I'm guessing in general low 30's in a regular company in Dublin or 10-20k more in google and more of other forms of compensation too.
EDIT: Looked up the Morgan Stanley report on Salaries, it says for 0-3 years experience salaries range on average between €30k-€45k.

dubrov

I've heard Google generally pay below the market rate.

They get away with it as some people are desperate to get it on their CV

matrim

14ned wrote: »

. I'd expect a fresh graduate in Dublin or Cork to start somewhere in the 20-30k region. I'd expect a fresh graduate anywhere else 15-25k region.

Anyone who pays 15k for a graduate software developer anywhere in Ireland isn't worth working for. Similarly anywhere that pays less than about 25k in Dublin is probably the same.

Tar.Aldarion

matrim wrote: »

Anyone who pays 15k for a graduate software developer anywhere in Ireland isn't worth working for. Similarly anywhere that pays less than about 25k in Dublin is probably the same.

I remember when I was looking as a grad and a place was offering 20k and had a terrible interview process, really gave the impression it would be a crap place to work. They started arguing with each other during the interview. I told the agency I wouldn't accept it even if offered, at that price. They acted like nobody ever got more than that and I was lucky to even be there. :rolleyes:

Don't let places take advantage of you. There is a guy over in work problems forum atm that was unpaid for his first 3 years and has now got a raise to €40k after 5...

rosmoke

smacl wrote: »

€43k average salary for Google software engineers according to paysacle.com, range is €27k to €73k so I'm guessing the lower end refers to graduate salary. Amazon come out a bit better at €51.6k average on a range of €31k to €88k. Glassdoor shows similar but slightly higher results. Payscale.com have a graduate software engineer salary average at €29.5k.

I've 3 colleagues that just signed the contract for next year as Graduate Software Engineers for 60k.

smacl

Tar.Aldarion wrote: »

Hmm well Google can be a strange one, I imagine the pay scale can be very different depending on the person and €60 or €90k for them for the right person is nothing. The average salary for a grad in Zurich for them is over €100k or so I read on glassdoor last year. The average in London is lower but a grad started there this year on £250k (I was over in their offices a while back and was talking about it), I imagine that person had a phd though, I didn't ask.


For Ireland I'm guessing in general low 30's in a regular company in Dublin or 10-20k more in google and more of other forms of compensation too.
EDIT: Looked up the Morgan Stanley report on Salaries, it says for 0-3 years experience salaries range on average between €30k-€45k.

I think companies that pay big bucks are buying demonstrable skills in specific niche areas. I've seen postgrads putting research projects on LinkedIn and ending up with good positions as a result. Demonstrable ability in areas such as ML, CUDA / general GPU programming, Blockchain development and Computer vision could improve the base salary significantly. In some cases these will be engineering or math degrees with programming rather than pure computer science though.

smacl

rosmoke wrote: »

I've 3 colleagues that just signed the contract for next year as Graduate Software Engineers for 60k.

Seems well over the odds, could possibly be defensive hiring based on anticipated future skills shortage.

incentsitive

I'd need to see a p60 before I'd believe them

Tar.Aldarion

Sounds legit to me, saw another forum with people posting their compensation, one from google as a grad in dublin: Salary : €67k (Total Comp : €93k)

smacl

Tar.Aldarion wrote: »

Sounds legit to me, saw another forum with people posting their compensation, one from google as a grad in dublin: Salary : €67k (Total Comp : €93k)

No reason to assume that its not legit, but my guess is we're talking about a competent programmer here with a proven track record (e.g. an open source project or freelancer) who also just happens to have graduated. I'd guess the being a fresh graduate is the least important part of the equation, and that as such it isn't a reasonable indicator of what CS graduates can expect more generally. First full-time programming job I got was on an excellent salary, even though I'd no CS qualification at the time, basically because the company I went to totted up how much they were already paying me contracting part time and hired me to save money.

rosmoke

It's impossible to graduate a CS degree and not have a good few projects under your belt at that stage. Even 2 projects would suffice, something you could talk about during your interview.

smacl

rosmoke wrote: »

It's impossible to graduate a CS degree and not have a good few projects under your belt at that stage. Even 2 projects would suffice, something you could talk about during your interview.

I've interviewed more than a few CS graduates in my day and have found the standard of programming to be weak among a fair proportion. Projects are often group efforts where one person from the group ends up doing most of the coding.
My experience has been that graduates from other technical disciplines such as engineering, physics and mathematics often program as well if not better than CS grads. Lots of them talk well in an interview and have a nice CV which is why it is imperative to include some actual skills test. I think where the CS graduate can win out is on the other aspects of software engineering such as analysis, design and testing, which are also important vocational skills.

Volturnus

I signed my contract in September for 40+, don't start till July.